A Bond Girl's Food Diary

The Taste Test: Mayonnaise

4th January 20184th January 20181 Comment

I am opening 2018 with a special Taste Test post. This is the first session for which I have had brought in a consultant. A specialist, if you will. My lovely friend Daisy is excellent in all respects, but kind of weird in that her favourite food is mayonnaise. ‘How much can a person really like mayonnaise?’ you might wonder. A lot, is the answer. I am not a mayonnaise expert, and there were a lot of samples to get through, so I brought in Daisy to do the heavy lifting on this one. Also I wasn’t as delighted with the concept of eating a whole load of mayonnaise as she was.

And we ate the mayonnaise on bread. We’re not animals.

As before, I feel I need a rambling disclaimer: obviously, I am doing this in my kitchen and not in a lab and I am not a scientist. Also, the products used in this series are just examples – obviously each supermarket has, say, eight or nine different types of mayonnaise or whatever the product may be, and I’m not going to try every single one because what am I, made of money?

Finally, I should highlight that we tasted all the products blind, and at the time of tasting and making our notes we didn’t know which product came from which shop. We sat in one room while my glamorous assistant (er, my husband), prepared the samples in another. Any notes added regarding packaging and so on were only done after blind tasting, when we learned which who had made product A, B, C and so on.

The Blind Taste Test: Mayonnaise

Mayonnaise
per 100g	£	kcal	fat	carb	fibre	protein	salt
Hellmann’s	0.75	721	79	1.3		1.1	1.5
Wilkin & Sons	0.92	748	81	3.5		1.8	1.27
Tesco	0.22	691	75	2.5		1.5	1.0
Waitrose	0.24	685	73	5.9		1.1	1.1
Sainsbury’s	0.23	677	73.2	3.5		1.0	0.9
Bramwell (Aldi)	0.12	722	78	3.9		0.8	0.96
Delouis	1.00	741	80	0.6		2	1.7

A – Tesco – 6/10

Looks very standard. Smells pretty lemony. Quite creamy, but fairly bland and a bit too oily. A bit of sharpness and a lemony flavour, but not salty enough. Fine, perfectly edible, but not very exciting.

B – Aldi – 3/10

Neutral colour. Thicker consistency than A. A bit of a strange taste – sour, but not in a good way. Not very pleasant to eat.

C – Sainsbury’s – 7/10

Tastes milder than the first two options. Quite light and quite creamy, but a good level of sharpness and salt too. Generally a pleasant sample, and good to eat.

D – Waitrose – 6/10

A very sharp smell, almost vinegar-y, that carries through on the taste. Light in texture, not oily. Not bad at all, but worth bearing in mind that it’s very sharp, so depends what you want to use it for.

E – Wilkin and Sons – 3/10

A very odd taste – weirdly sweet, especially in comparison to the other samples. Not enough sharpness, very cloying. Very different to the others.

F – Delouis – 8/10

Most visually different – very yellow, like butter. Tasted completely different to the other samples. A good lemon flavour, and really tasted like it contained real eggs. Interesting, complex. Good level of saltiness too.

G – Hellmann’s – 5/10

Looks very white. No particular smell, and that carries through to the taste – nothing distinctive. Nothing wrong with it, but very dull. A good vehicle for other stuff.

Conclusions

I didn’t know if I would be able to taste the difference between the different types of mayonnaise, as it’s not something I eat lots of or feel particularly strongly about, but actually the samples were all really distinctive, so this was more interesting than I thought it might be.

So, two favourites here. If you’re looking for a good, cheap, standard option, then Sainsbury’s own is your winner. We both preferred it to Hellmann’s, and it’s less than half the price of the brand leader. If you’re looking for something a bit special to go alongside something fancy, then the Delouis is delicious and was the favourite sample for both of us. It’s also by far the most expensive option. Sometimes these experiments are surprising and the cheapest thing is the most delicious, but sometimes you have to pay for quality.

Also, at the risk of invalidating this entire post, homemade mayonnaise is delicious, and actually pretty simple to make. Just saying.

Caramel Apple Crumble

2nd January 20182nd January 20183 Comments

Hello January. My last recipe was a healthy salad option. This is a decadent and delicious crumble. Absolutely packed with warming buttery goodness. As you might be able to tell, I don’t really go in for the whole health kick January thing. Yes, some post-Christmas moderation is absolutely fine, if that’s what you want to do to feel better in yourself. But cutting out entire food groups is the road to sadness. January is hard enough for us all without ditching stuff that can bring us pleasure. I plan to spend January eating plenty of tasty homemade food, and that will include salads and soups and stews and fish, but also crumbles and brownies and pie. Because I’m a realist (about this, anyway).

Also, I love crumble. Humble crumble is an underrated dessert. But god, it’s just so delicious. And easy. And adaptable. This week I am bringing you this classic apple crumble number with a caramel and calvados twist. Next week, I am going to bring you a completely different crumble recipe. It will use the exact same proportions and method, but I’ll tweak the ingredients to make a different dish.

As I write this, it’s flat and grey outside. The trees are bare. It’s pouring with rain. The cat is bored and fed up of hanging out with me, but doesn’t want to leave because the weather is so grim, so she’s just giving me evil looks as if I am the one who has ruined the outside world. This is the morning that most people have gone back to work – as, indeed, have I, but I get to do the work from my living room. This month can be rough on us all, so let’s try to be kind to ourselves and each other. For instance, I am going to continue to lavish affection on the cat, even though she keeps sitting on the keyboard while I am trying to type because she’s cross that I’m working instead of playing with her. Baby steps.

Notes

Once you have the basic proportions and method down, you can do a million different things with a crumble recipe. I’ll give you another example next week. Because I care about you all.

This will make 6-8 portions. I am not saying it will feed 6-8 people, because we can happily polish this off between the two of us. Not in one sitting. I think crumble makes a great breakfast.

Ingredients

For the crumble topping

240g plain flour
120g golden caster sugar
130g cold butter, cut into pieces
100g hazelnuts, blitzed in food processor or finely chopped

For the base

200g sultanas
100ml calvados (or brandy of your choice, or feel free to skip the alcohol)
6 medium eating apples
70g unsalted butter
70g light brown soft brown sugar
2 tsp ground cinnamon
100g caramel (homemade or from a jar)

Cream or ice cream, to serve

Method

Pop the sultanas and the calvados in a bowl together so the sultanas can absorb some of the alcohol.
Heat your oven to 190C/170C fan/gas 5. Tip the flour and sugar into a large bowl. Add the butter, then rub into the flour with your fingers until you reach breadcrumb texture. Stir in the hazelnuts. Spread the crumble evenly over a baking sheet and bake for 15 minutes, or until lightly coloured.
Meanwhile, peel, core and cut the apples into chunks. Put the butter and sugar in a large saucepan and melt together over a medium heat. Cook for a couple of minutes until everything is dissolved, and the mixture is a caramel colour. Stir in the apples, and cook for 5 minutes. Add the sultanas, any remaining alcohol that hasn’t been absorbed, and cinnamon, and cook for 5 minutes more. Tip the mixture into your chosen crumble dish. Dot it with spoonfuls of the caramel.
Top the fruit with your crumble. Cook the whole thing in the oven for around 15 minutes, or until hot through, golden, and bubbling. Serve with cream or ice cream.

Beetroot, Tangerine, and Kale Salad

29th December 201729th December 20171 Comment

Christmas is over, and I have spent the last week living on chocolate, mince pies, and various forms of potato. Obviously this is brilliant, but I am starting to feel like I should supplement this excellent diet with some food with nutritional value. Don’t get me wrong, I am still going to enjoy working through my Christmas chocolate and all of the traditionally carb-and-cheese-laden foods of the season. I am just going to punctuate it with some fruits and vegetables.

It’s still perfectly possible to have delicious, colourful, healthy meals as we head towards the end of the year. This dish makes use of plenty of seasonal ingredients that are thriving right now, including beetroot, kale, and, if you fancy, mackerel.

The sweetness and sharpness of the citrus here contrast beautifully with the earthiness of the beetroot, and the bright orange, rich purple, and deep green in this dish will bring a bit of life to any winter table. You can make a big batch of this salad and keep it in the fridge to eat alone or with your chosen additional protein for satisfying lunches or light dinners.

Notes

This will serve 4-6 people (depending on how hungry you are!) as a side dish.

If you want to use this as a base for a main course, it’s great with pan-fried mackerel fillets (or fish of your choice) or topped with generous discs of goats’ cheese.

Clementines, satsumas, or oranges would also work well in place of tangerines.

Ingredients

100g blanched hazelnuts
4 medium raw beetroot
200g uncooked quinoa, or a 250g cooked quinoa pouch if you prefer – any colour is fine
a good bunch of cavolo nero or kale stalks
3 tangerines
2 tbsp finely chopped fresh tarragon
plenty of extra virgin olive oil
sea salt and pepper, to season

Method

Set your oven to 220C/ 200C fan/ gas 6. Spread your hazelnuts out on a lipped baking tray and pop them in the oven to toast for five minutes while it heats up.
Meanwhile, peel your beetroot and cut them into halves (or quarters if they are particularly large). Your hazelnuts should be toasted by now, so take them out of the oven and pop them into a bowl. Put your beetroot on the baking tray and toss it with a generous glug of olive oil, then season generously. Roast for 15-20 minutes, or until cooked through.
While your beetroot cooks, cook your quinoa according to pack instructions (if you’re not using a pre-cooked pouch). Tear your kale leaves from their thick stalks into rough ribbons, and pop them in a large bowl. Sprinkle them with a pinch of sea salt, then massage the leaves for a couple of minutes until they seem darker and shrink down a little.
Peel your tangerines, then slice them into rounds and put them in the same bowl as the kale. Add the chopped tarragon and cooked quinoa. Finally, roughly chop your hazelnuts, and mix them in. Finish it all off with a couple of tbsps of olive oil stirred through, and taste and season.
Serve the salad alone for a lighter meal, or top with fish or discs of goats cheese.

Review: The Jericho Tavern

20th December 201721st December 2017Leave a comment

The Jericho Tavern has a lot of history behind it. It’s a bit of an Oxford institution, in no small part due to its dedicated venue space where a lot of celebrated bands have played. While other pubs and restaurants around it have come and gone, The Jericho has remained. My husband, as a musician, has both played and attended several gigs there. They also run lots of other events: I once went to a yoga class that ran upstairs (#pubyoga is the only way you might get me to exercise). The pub has a lot of memories attached to it, both for us and for lots of other people in Oxford. So when we heard it had been given a bit of a face lift, and had a shiny new menu, we were only too happy to go along and check it out.

The main pub downstairs is huge, but manages to feel cosy rather than cavernous thanks to its deep blue walls, plush comfy benches, hidden away corners, and the friendly welcome we received on arrival. The dining area boasts huge windows with pretty stained glass that let in a lot of light and make The Jericho the perfect spot for watching the world come and go on Walton Street.

The menus are all available online, if you fancy a gander, but there’s a sandwich menu, a main menu, and a Sunday menu. Food is ordered at the bar. We were ordering off the main menu, which was full of tempting choices. The Sharers section looked great, particularly the Burger Board with its selection of twelve little burgers, but even we’d struggle to manage a dozen burgers between two people so sadly it was not to be this time. The snacks were also tempting, particularly the Pulled Pork Pie and the handmade Scotch Egg, but we were there for proper lunch. And proper lunch we got.

I went for the 21 Day Aged Sirloin Steak, Mini Yorkshire Puddings Filled with Caramelised Onions, Triple Cooked Chips and Horseradish Butter. You know, a simple, light, healthy weekday lunch. Yup. James had the Chicken, Portobello Mushroom, Leek & Pancetta Pie with Roasted Roots and Triple Cooked Chips.

Unusually, James definitely won on ordering here. I sometimes choose steak as a good litmus test for a new menu – something simple that’s easy to do well but is often done badly – but I would definitely have plumped for James’s lunch if I was choosing between the two. My steak tasted great and had a lot of flavour, which I enjoyed, but it was a little tough. The menu advertised miniature Yorkshires filled with caramelised onions, but as you can see from the picture, I got one Yorkshire and a pot of caramelised onions on the side. Nothing wrong with that, but if you’re going to specify mini Yorkshires you might as well serve them. The horseradish butter was great, though, and the chips were absolutely excellent. Perfectly crispy outside, fluffy inside, well-seasoned, and addictive. Exactly as chips should be.

James’s pie, while deceptively simple in appearance. was very tasty. Great pastry, buttery and full of flavour with a lovely flake and crunch, and a satisfyingly rich and meaty filling. His chips were as great as the ones that came with the steak, and the roasted root vegetables, while not especially exciting, tasted lovely.

By this point, James was ‘too full for dessert’. This is not a state I really understand, because I am never too full for dessert, so I ordered the Sticky Toffee Pudding and got two spoons, assuming I could persuade him to have a tiny nibble. This didn’t turn out to be an issue, because the pudding was delicious. Rich, warming, full of texture and flavour, and gloriously sweet and sticky. Definitely a winner.

I also should point out that we attended the relaunch party for the Jericho Tavern a couple of weeks before this lunch, and ate that night too. I had the chicken katsu burger and James had the sausage and mash. No pictures, I’m afraid, but both were really very good indeed and we’d happily go back and eat them again.

The service we received at the pub was excellent. The staff were friendly and helpful, and all of our food arrived in good time despite the fact that the pub was packed with Christmas party bookings. Generally, it was a very pleasant experience and we had a lovely lunch.

The only little thing I would note is that it was very chilly inside. I am always cold and it was literally snowing on the day we visited, so I was prepared to dismiss this as being just my problem, but then I heard someone on the table next to us say it was freezing. My husband asked one of the staff members if he could turn on the radiator, which was stone cold and clearly off, but, although the guy was very friendly and helpful, he couldn’t work out how to get it going. This is only a minor complaint though, and I’m sure it’s something fixable.

Overall, the refurbishment of The Jericho looks to have been a success. They’ve smartened up, but kept the heart and essence of the pub alive, making it a fresher version of the place people have loved for years. The new modern menu is full of interesting options, and it was good to see choices suitable for vegetarians and vegans too. The food we’ve tried there so far has all been tasty and satisfying, ranging from good to great. If you’re in the Jericho area and looking for a hearty and delicious pub meal, then The Jericho Tavern is the place to go.

Disclaimer: The Jericho kindly provided us with a complimentary meal in exchange for a review, but all opinions are, as ever, my own.

Menemen

19th December 201719th December 20175 Comments

So, I don’t think it can be denied that I have made the effort to get into the Christmas spirit around here. There have been mulled wine brownies. A Christmas cheat sheet. And even a heroic effort to eat all the world’s mince pies. But you know what? Not everything we eat at this time of year is mulled or sprinkled with glitter. So here is a completely seasonally inappropriate recipe that’s also completely delicious. I’ve called this Menemen because it sounds more exciting than ‘very liberal interpretation of a Turkish egg and pepper dish’, but this isn’t really Menemen in any true sense of the word. It’s also part Shakshuka, and part random invention. It’s an ideal brunch solution though, and very very tasty.

I have been making some variation on this for years, but only thought to put it on the blog when my brother asked me for the recipe after I made it at a family gathering a couple of months ago. When my brother asks for the recipe for something then I know it must have been a winner.

This is, of course, the sort of thing you can be fairly liberal with. If you have other vegetables you’d like to toss in – sliced courgettes, say, or a handful of spinach – then do. You can skip the bread if you don’t fancy it, although I promise you it’s excellent for mopping up all those tasty juices. And obviously, if you’re catering for vegetarians then you can pass on the chorizo. It will still be lovely either way.

Notes

This will serve 2-3 people, but it’s easy to scale up by adding more eggs. It’s an excellent thing to plonk down in the middle of a table so that people can help themselves.

Add chilli flakes (or skip them) according to your tolerance for spicy food. I like to make this with a good kick, but appreciate that not everyone will feel the same.

Ingredients

Extra virgin olive oil
1 red onion
3 red or orange peppers
125g chorizo
3 cloves garlic
1 heaped tsp cumin
1 heaped tsp paprika
chilli flakes, to taste
2 tins or cartons of chopped tomatoes
4 or 5 medium eggs
100g feta
handful of pistachios
bunch of fresh parsley
bread, to serve

Method

Gently heat a glug of olive oil in a large frying pan while you slice a red onion. Toss the onion in and cook on a medium heat to soften. Meanwhile, slice your peppers, and add them to the onion once it’s begun to soften. Cut your chorizo into small coins or half moons, turn up the heat, and add it to the pan. After a minute or two, when the chorizo has started to release its oil and is smelling amazing, crush your garlic. Add your garlic to the pan, stir, and cook for a minute. Add your cumin, paprika, and chilli flakes, stir, and cook for a minute more.
Add your chopped tomatoes to the pan, stir, and put them on a medium heat. Let the mixture bubble away form around ten minutes. Taste your tomato base, and season as needed.
Use a wooden spoon to make four or five (depending on how many eggs you are using) wells in the tomato base. Crack an egg into each, and turn the heat down to low. Pop a lid on the pan. The eggs will now poach in the tomato sauce.
Crumble your feta, roughly chop your pistachios, and chop your parsley. After about five or six minutes, your eggs should be ready – you want the white cooked, but the yolk runny. Sprinkle your feta, pistachios, and parsley over the pan. Bring it all to the table and serve directly from the pan, with bread.

The Taste Test: Mince Pies

14th December 201714th December 20172 Comments

Not going to lie, this was the best morning. I had mince pies for breakfast. Outside there was a carpet of perfect snow. It was still falling past the windows in a picturesque manner. Mince pies smell amazing. Especially six of them.

Now, the observant among you may notice that three of the mince pie samples are from Waitrose. Normally I try to spread the purchasing of Taste Test food out in a more effective way. But what can I say? I walked into Waitrose, I must have blacked out, and when I left I was clutching three different boxes of mince pies. And some other stuff. It happens fairly often, to be honest. I thought about leaving one of them out, but they were different. I wanted to try them all. Look, I don’t have to justify this madness, okay? This is my crazy series of random experiments.

As before, I feel I need a rambling disclaimer: obviously, I am doing this in my kitchen and not in a lab and I am not a scientist. These are the opinions of one person – that said, one person who has been trained to taste for quality. Also, the products used in this series are just examples – obviously each supermarket has, say, eight or nine different types of mince pies or whatever the product may be, and I’m not going to try every single one because what am I, made of money?

Finally, I should highlight that I tasted all the products blind, and at the time of tasting and making my notes I didn’t know which product came from which shop. I sat in one room while my glamorous assistant (er, my husband), prepared the samples in another. Any notes added regarding packaging and so on were only done after blind tasting, when I learned which who had made product A, B, C, D, or E.

The Blind Taste Test: Mince Pies

Mince Pies
100g	£ – per pie	kcal	fat	carb	fibre	protein	salt
Waitrose -All Butter Mince Pies	2.50 pack, 42p per pie	391	14.6	60	3.3	3.3	0.25
Aldi – Cognac Steeped Mince Pies	1.49 pack, 25p per pie	361	11	59	2.6	3.8	0.1
Tesco – All Butter Mince Pies with Cognac	2.00 pack, 33p per pie	401	16.7	56.2	2.7	5.0	0.2
Essential Waitrose Shortcrust Mince Pies	1.00 per pack, 17p per pie	423	17.7	60.1	3.4	4.0	0.25
Heston from Waitrose Spiced Shortcrust Mince Pies with Lemon Twist	3.00 per pack, 75p per pie	365	12.7	58.3	2.0	3.3	0.40
Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference All Butter Mince Pies infused with Brandy	1.50 per pack, 25p per pie	389	13.8	61.9	2.0	3.2	0.33

A – Sainsbury’s – 7/10

The only one with an incomplete lid – a star-shaped piece of pastry. Very crumbly when you cut through the pie, doesn’t hold together fantastically. Lovely smell, definitely get the booze. Nice pastry, with good crispness and sugar on top. The mince meat has good texture, with chunks of fruit. A good mince pie, but not exceptional. Solid option.

B – Waitrose – 6/10

One of the plainest in appearance. Not quite as well filled as A – significant gap between the filling and top of the pie. Holds together well when cut though, doesn’t crumble apart. A smoother mince meat than A, with less interesting texture, and a less buttery and flavoursome pastry. Not bad, not great.

C – Aldi – 7/10

Pretty snowflake pattern on top. Crumbles when cut through, doesn’t hold shape. Pastry not hugely buttery. Nice filling, with a good flavour, and a hit of booze. Definitely enjoyed eating it.

D – Waitrose Essential – 3/10

Plainest in appearance. Cuts well, doesn’t fall apart. Mince meat is very smooth, like a paste, and doesn’t taste as nice as the others – quite sharp. Pastry is very powdery, tastes cheap, disappears in the mouth. Didn’t like it.

E – Tesco – 8/10

A lovely crispy sugary top. Pies holds together well when cut. Tasty pastry. Mince meat is good – plainly visible different fruits and textures, with a good balance between sharpness and sweetness, and noticeable alcohol.

F – Heston – 9/10

This is advertised as a mince pie but looks almost like a tart. It has a crumble sort of topping rather than a normal pastry topping, and is larger and shallower than the others. It almost seems unfair to judge it alongside the other samples as it’s incredibly different. The thin layer of mince meat balances well with the top and has a great citrus flavour. It’s also finished with icing sugar. It’s really tasty, but not a traditional mince pie.

Conclusions

God, mince pies are great, aren’t they?

A bit of an odd one this week, which is my own fault for getting a weird Heston product. But I couldn’t help it – I was intrigued. So it’s messed up my results. My favourite thing to eat from all the samples was the Heston Spiced Mince Pie with a Lemon Twist, which was unusual and really tasty. But if we’re being strict about the mince pie criteria, my winner was the Tesco Finest All Butter Pastry Deep Filled Mince Pie with Cognac. That would be my pick if you’re looking for a more traditional offering.

The only one I actively didn’t like was the Waitrose Essential sample – although it’s worth noting those were 17p per pie, while the Heston ones are a whopping 75p per pie. So I guess you get what you pay for here. The Sainsburys and Aldi pies were also completely acceptable.

Yes, I know, there are loads more types of mince pies, but I simply cannot try everything! If you want to buy stuff for me to taste then I am cool with that. Just saying.

Mulled Wine Brownies

13th December 201713th December 20173 Comments

I know what you’re thinking. This blog just doesn’t have enough brownie recipes. I agree. It’s a serious problem. Don’t worry, I’m here to help. Mulled wine brownies it is.

I was never really a huge fan of mulled wine until they gave us some of the really good stuff at culinary school and it was one of the most delicious things I have ever had to drink. Now I have developed a taste for it and have a highly positive opinion of mulled wine flavoured things. Hence, these brownies.

Because I have a whole cupboard full of cake ingredients, I have edible glitter to hand at all times, but obviously it tastes of nothing and I only added it to these brownies to make them sparkly. Because it’s Christmas (almost). And it feels right and proper to put glitter on everything.

Ingredients:

140g butter
200g good quality 70% dark chocolate
225g golden caster
2 eggs, plus 1 egg yolk
1 tsp almond extract
120ml red wine
zest of 1 orange
110g plain flour
generous grating of whole nutmeg
1/4 tsp ground cloves
1/2 tsp ginger
1/2 tsp cinnamon
75g dried cherries

Method:

Break your chocolate into pieces and chop your butter into rough cubes. Place them both in a glass or metal bowl over a pan of gently simmering water and leave them to melt, stirring occasionally. Preheat your oven to 180C/160C fan/gas 4. Grease and line a 20x20cm square tin.
While your chocolate and butter melt, weigh your sugar, and mix your eggs with your extra yolk and your almond extract. When your chocolate and butter have completely melted, beat in your sugar (I use an electric hand whisk), followed by your eggs. Add your red wine and orange zest. Add your flour and spices to the mixture and beat that in too. Stir through your dried cherries.
Pour the mixture into the tin and smooth the surface. Bake for around 20-25 minutes. The brownies will have risen and started to crack a little round the edges, but still be soft in the middle. They will firm as they cool.

HelloFresh Christmas Cheat Sheet

9th December 201720th December 20173 Comments

As I said in my recent post about how to host a hassle-free dinner party, the main trick to pulling off a spectacular meal is being organised. Planning ahead. Getting your prep done beforehand. But I admit that this sometimes feels a bit… dull. Even I, although I really do know better, sometimes can’t be bothered to plan things properly and just decide to wing it. And I always regret it.

At culinary school, we had to make a time plan before every single cooking session. Which meant writing one every day. Literally ‘11.30am: Second turn of puff pastry, start making caramel’, kind of thing. It was necessary to handle the hugely complex dishes we were putting together in class, but it’s not something I do in my day-to-day cooking. Even though I definitely plan, I don’t normally give myself a timetable. Except for Christmas dinner. And that’s where HelloFresh‘s cheat sheet comes in.

If you’re the kind of person that sighs and fidgets at the thought of putting together a cooking schedule for yourself on Christmas day, fear not. HelloFresh have literally done it for you. They sent me a copy of their cheat sheet to have a look at, and it’s absolute gold for an organisational nut like me. They’ve worked out what you can make ahead and do the night before. They’ve made you a scheduled timeline for your Christmas Day cooking. And they’ve even included lots of recipes for tasty side dishes, in case you’re struggling with what to do with your parsnips this year.

You can get the cheat sheet for free here.

It will be particularly useful if you’re the person in charge of Christmas dinner this year, but you’ve not done it before. Or if you’re stressed about the thought of cooking all those complicated bits and pieces and getting everything to be ready at the same time.

I cook the Christmas dinner in my family – when you have trained as a chef, you are responsible for the food at every family gathering for the rest of your life. Although some things stay the same every year, I like to mix it up too. We always have a goose, for example, but I like to try different ways of cooking and flavouring it. We always have braised red cabbage, but sometimes I try different ways of cooking other side dishes. There will be a Christmas pudding, but I always include another dessert as well, and that varies depending on my mood. The cheat sheet above has some great simple side dish recipes that you can try if you fancy mixing it up. I tested a few of them before writing this post, and I can guarantee that they are tasty.

Are you in charge of making the Christmas dinner in your family? Do you have any particular traditions? Do you like the exact same meal every year or do you mix it up? I’d love to hear! We never have bread sauce which, I am assured, means it’s we’re failing at Christmas…

Disclaimer: This post was sponsored by HelloFresh, but as always, all opinions are my own.

The Taste Test: Butter

7th December 20176th December 20176 Comments

Butter was actually another suggestion for a Taste Test post from a friend. It’s great: these days people just suggest products to me so I no longer have to come up with all the ideas myself. Crowd-sourced creativity. Anyway, butter is an excellent idea for one of these posts, because it’s the sort of thing I tend to buy without thinking and so it’s always good to explore what other options are out there, and challenge my unquestioned assumption that my preferred butter is a solid choice.

It should be noted that I go through a fairly serious amount of butter. There is a butter shelf in the door of my fridge which is, at all times, filled with a frankly shocking number of packs of butter. This is because I bake most days, and therefore have the basics in stock at all times (you should see the ‘baking cupboard’). So I have a vested interest in this.

Of course, when you’re baking with butter, you won’t massively notice the difference between different brands (although you definitely notice a difference between butter and fake butter). But when the quality of your butter really matters is when you are eating it on toast. I bake a lot of bread, and there are few things more delicious than a generous hunk of bread, warm from the oven, spread liberally with soft salted butter.

All these butter samples are salted, by the way. Partly for consistency, and partly because I never buy unsalted butter. And I ate it with bread, because even I can’t eat straight butter.

As before, I feel I need a rambling disclaimer: obviously, I am doing this in my kitchen and not in a lab and I am not a scientist. These are the opinions of one person – that said, one person who has been trained to taste for quality. Also, the products used in this series are just examples – obviously each supermarket has, say, eight or nine different types of butter or whatever the product may be, and I’m not going to try every single one because what am I, made of money?

The Blind Taste Test: Butter

Butter
100g	£	kcal	fat	carb	fibre	protein	salt
Waitrose	0.80	725	80	0.5	0	0.7	3.0
Trewithen	0.61	744	82	0.6	0	0.6	1.8
Isigny	0.80	725	80	0.5	0	0.7	2
Aldi Everyday	0.54	737	81	0.8	0	0.6	1.7
Lurpak	0.80	739	82	0.7	0	0.6	1.2
Tesco	0.64	745	82.2	0.6	0	0.6	1.5

A – Isigny Ste-Mere – 6/10

Quite noticably salty – a bit too salty, even for me, and I have a salt-tooth. A nice creaminess to it, but also seems a bit oily. Not bad, but not particularly interesting.

B – Aldi – Everyday Essentials – 5/10

Lighter in texture than A, and much less salty – kind of disappears in your mouth. A little saltiness at the end but no real flavour.

C – Waitrose – Brittany butter with sea salt crystals – 8/10

One of the thicker and more lightly coloured butters. Pleasantly creamy. A nice level of salt for my tastes. Has a noticeable ‘real butter’ taste.

D – Trewithen Dairy Cornish Butter – 7/10

Enjoyable to eat – a nice flavour to it and a good level of saltiness. My second favourite choice.

E – Tesco – 5/10

Very light, another butter that disappears in your mouth. A little salt on the finish but not much on the actual eating. Not quite enough flavour for me.

F – Lurpak – 5/10

A little oily, and a little bland. Not salty enough for me, although bear in mind I have a high salt tolerance.

Conclusions

First conclusion: bread and butter is tasty. I should stop with all the fancy stuff and eat more bread and butter.

None of these were terrible. If I was just eating nice bread with nice butter then, I’m afraid, I’d definitely go for the Waitrose option here, which is on the expensive end (although tied for most expensive with two others, including Lurpak, who are a big brand and which I found disappointingly bland). That said, my second favourite was Trewithen, and that was the second cheapest option.

If you’re buying butter to eat on bread, then go for the nice stuff. If you’re just cooking with it, it doesn’t really matter, because they are all fine. I still wouldn’t buy fake butter though.

Sgroppino

5th December 20174th December 2017Leave a comment

Continuing apace with my recent themes of delicious things you can do with ice cream and things that might help you out at dinner parties, I bring you Sgroppino: an Italian ice cream cocktail. Well, my version of it, anyway. The original is usually made with lemon sorbet and limoncello, but I was sent this White Chocolate and Strawberry Meringue Ice Cream from Northern Bloc to play with and my immediate thought was that it would be great in a dessert cocktail.

These little Sgroppinos are excellent because they are both a simple dessert, and an exciting alcoholic drink. You could also go all out and start off the evening with a round of these, as an indicator of the excellence of things to come.

I actually first learned about a version of this recipe when working with the cookery school. We sometimes served it at the end of hen parties, and it always went down particularly well. This is obviously my own interpretation of the recipe and, of course, you could go further and try it with different berries or spirits.

Ingredients (per person, multiply as needed)

1 scoop of White Chocolate and Strawberry Meringue Ice Cream
2 tbsps Chambord (cassis also works well, as does vodka, or liqueur of your choice)
1 tbsp strawberry coulis (see below)
1 glass Prosecco
fresh strawberries and/or a handful of pomegranate seeds

for the strawberry coulis (or you can buy some)

125g strawberries, fresh or defrosted from frozen
icing sugar
a dash of lemon juice

Method

If you are making your strawberry coulis rather than buying it, blitz the strawberries in a food processor or liquidiser with a couple of tablespoons of icing sugar and a squeeze of lemon juice. Taste, then add more sugar or lemon juice as needed. Sieve, then set aside until needed.
To make the Sgroppinos, put a generous scoop of the ice cream into your chosen glass, top with your chosen liqueur and your strawberry coulis, then fill the glass with Prosecco. It will fizz up in a very satisfying way. Finish with your choice of fresh fruit.

Disclaimer: The ice cream used in this review was kindly provided to me free of charge by Northern Bloc, but I genuinely loved it and all opinions are, as ever, my own.*

The Blind Taste Test: Mayonnaise

Mayonnaise

per 100g

£

kcal

fat

carb

fibre

protein

salt

Hellmann’s

0.75

721

79

1.3

1.1

1.5

Wilkin & Sons

0.92

748

81

3.5

1.8

1.27

Tesco

0.22

691

75

2.5

1.5

1.0

Waitrose

0.24

685

73

5.9

1.1

1.1

Sainsbury’s

0.23

677

73.2

3.5

1.0

0.9

Bramwell (Aldi)

0.12

722

78

3.9

0.8

0.96

Delouis

1.00

741

80

0.6

2

1.7

A – Tesco – 6/10

B – Aldi – 3/10

C – Sainsbury’s – 7/10

D – Waitrose – 6/10

E – Wilkin and Sons – 3/10

F – Delouis – 8/10

Conclusions

Notes

Ingredients

Method

Notes

Ingredients

Method

Disclaimer: The Jericho kindly provided us with a complimentary meal in exchange for a review, but all opinions are, as ever, my own.

Notes

Ingredients

Method

The Blind Taste Test: Mince Pies

Mince Pies

100g

£ – per pie